“Well, I know you don’t work for me, but from what I hear, I’d sure as hell be grateful if you could help me find out the answer to that question.”
“Those are precisely my intentions, Mr. President. The director of MI6, as you may know, has ordered my counterintelligence unit, Red Banner, to find out who sank that cruise ship and how. Since Red Banner is composed of both MI6 and CIA assets, I also report to Director Kelly as well as Sir David.”
The president turned to Kelly.
“What do you think, Brick?”
“I think that if Alex Hawke says the Russians had nothing to do with this, then the Russians had nothing to do with it. Alex, was your entire interview with Lyachin taped?”
“Yes. I will make a call immediately and get a copy of that tape electronically transmitted to Air Force One as quickly as possible. Sorry I didn’t think of that before.”
“You got nothing to be sorry for, son. No idea how you pulled off this interview, but I’ll tell you what. You just saved all of us a lot of useless hand-wringing over what the hell Putin was up to. Now we just need to learn who possesses cyberwarfare technology at this level. Anson, could you give us an update on who the major players are in this new cyber arms race?”
“Certainly. In no particular order, the countries using linked supercomputers to advance these kinds of AI programs the most rapidly would be Israel, China, Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, and, possibly, North Korea. If I had to guess, based on the most recent intelligence I’ve seen, China has taken the lead in this field.”
“If I may, Mr. President,” Hawke said, “based on that list, I would say our primary suspects are China and North Korea.”
“It’s a place to start, Alex,” Brick Kelly said. “So let’s get started.”
At that moment, there appeared to be a power failure; his teleconference screen went black. Alex Hawke had just lost his connection with Air Force One.
“R ed One Leader, I got a little glitch here, over,” USAF Lieutenant Mick Millard said to his wing commander. Millard was flying the Red Three position off Air Force One: one mile aft and to starboard.
“This is Cheyenne, Sixshooter,” Captain Steve Powell, the wing commander flying the Red One slot to port said. “Talk to Papa.”
“Yessir. I… uh… had three unexplained turbine power surges. Squawk’s out… and…’’
“And what?”
“Shit!”
“Sixshooter, are you declaring an emergency?”
“My gear’s lowering and retracting! Shit! All by itself! What the hell?”
“Sixshooter, Cheyenne, break off! Break off! Out of formation, that is an order, now!”
“I… uh… wait a minute… I… uh… can’t… nothing is responding… ailerons… rudder… the damn plane is flying itself, sir… like automatic pilot… I have no control… None…”
There was a blast of static as USAF Captain Powell contacted the cockpit of the president’s airplane.
“Air Force One, we have a serious problem at Red Three. Systems malfunction. Pilot reports…”
“Red One Leader, break, this is Sixshooter, my radar just lit up… what the-”
“Air Force One, take immediate evasive action… deploy chaff… flares… I say again, immediate evasive action… F-15 on your aft starboard quarter is a bogie…”
“Red One Leader,” said the incredulous captain on the big 747, “are you saying one of our own damn-”
“Air Force One, dive! Dive! You have armed Sidewinders at your zero angle, sir!”
“Hostile situation alert,” the captain said calmly over the airplane’s intercom. “All crew and passengers. Seated and buckled up. Now.”
Suddenly the giant 747’s nose pitched down, the aircraft now in a nearly vertical dive, and the pilot deployed defensive countermeasures. At the tailcone section, just above the auxiliary power units, was the MATADOR IRCM (Infra-Red Countermeasures System). This device, activated in response to a direct missile threat, spews out signals of such intensity that an incoming missile, homing onto hot areas, the engine exhausts, is suddenly overwhelmed by so many false signal noises that it loses its lock and flies past the target. These same systems are also located above the four engine nacelles, all aimed aft.
The wing commander, call sign Cheyenne, peeled away and did a “bat-turn,” a tight, high G, turn that put him right on Sixshooter’s tail.
“Sixshooter, I order you to eject immediately. Affirmative?”
“Arming the seat, sir. Shit, that’s working at least… independent system…”
“Pull that goddamn red handle, son. Right goddamn now!”
“Sir, I’m trying, but…”
“But nothing. I’ve got you locked on. I’m giving you exactly five seconds to get out. Then I’m pulling the trigger… on my mark, five… four…”
A keening alarm could be heard from inside the cockpit of Sixshooter’s F-15. His missiles were armed and about to launch. His voice cracked and broke as he made his reply. “Pull that trigger now, sir. I got a rogue Sidewinder with the fuse lit. Launch right now, sir, before this damn-”
“God bless and keep you, son,” Cheyenne said, and launched his missile.
“God bless America, sir,” were the last words heard from Sixshooter before he and his aircraft were vaporized.
Red Team Leader’s AIM-9X Sidewinder air-to-air heat-seeking missile homed in on the exhaust of Sixshooter’s F-15 Eagle. A conical sensor in the missile’s nose cone registered optimum destructive range and triggered the warhead.
Lieutenant Mick Millard, Sixshooter, died instantly in a blinding ball of flame. Aboard Air Force One, Captain Dickenson leveled off at ten thousand feet and immediately notified the president and Angel’s entire crew that the threat had been nullified.
A few long minutes later, Colonel Danny Barr, Angel’s copilot, along with the airplane’s physician, Doctor and Rear Admiral Connie Mariano, peeked into the conference room. Once the rogue F-15 had been destroyed, the 747 leveled, completely unharmed save for the nervous systems of everyone aboard. Colonel Barr was deeply relieved to see the president and everyone else buckled in. Scared, dazed maybe, but unhurt.
“Everybody all right? Sorry, Mr. President, I know we didn’t give you much of a heads-up to strap in tight before we took evasive action.”
Starting with the president, Dr. Mariano went to each person in the conference room, checking pulses, pupil dilation, and asking a few questions to determine whether or not anyone wanted a mild sedative. No one did.
“What in God’s name happened, Danny?” the president asked.
“Yes, sir, well, we’re still trying to figure that out, both up in the cockpit and with tech support down on the ground. Apparently, the airplane flying Red Three today suffered a catastrophic systems failure.”
“There’s an understatement. Damn thing tried to shoot us down.”
“Yes, sir. The pilot lost all control of his aircraft, Mr. President. The way the skipper put it to the engineers on the ground, he said, ‘the airplane was completely co-opted.’ ”
“Co-opted?”
“Somebody else was flying that airplane, sir. One minute the pilot had control, the next minute, he was riding a drone. His radar went active, he painted us, and then his weapon system armed. That F-15 was seconds away from launching a Sidewinder at us when Red Team Leader took him out, sir.”
“Did that poor boy get out first?”
“No, sir. His ejection seat was inoperable.”
“Thank you, Admiral Mariano; thank you, Danny, appreciate your help. That will be all.”
Once the door had closed, the president said, “I’d say this crisis just escalated, if that isn’t too much of an understatement for you.”
“It’s insane, Mr. President,” Anson Beard, the secretary of defense, said, squeezing his temples with his forefingers. “Just insane.”
“Not an ‘it,’ Anson, but a ‘who.’ Who the hell has amassed this kind of power? Hell, you could bring the whole damn world crashing down with something like this. We’re going to spend the rest of this flight lighting up the secure phones; how many we have on board, twenty-eight or so? I want everyone notified immediately, Defense,
